The League Of Extraordinary Muskehounds

Naturally, The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Nemo: Heart Of Ice is full of reference and allusion to other literary works. Some are obvious, some obscure, and many worth seeking out.

But there’s one that just grabbed my infantile mind. It’s early on in the book, as the crew of the Nautilus travel to Metapatagonia.

That was a land from the 18th century novel novel by Restif de la Bretonne, <La Decouverte Australe par un Homme-Volant> or “The discovery of Australia by a flying man”. Metapatagonia is a land in the fantasy-fictional Australia that is a mirror image of France where the people speak backwards French and wear hats shaped like shoes. That’s the kind of reference you’ve been conditioned to expect in the League, and indeed we understood in Black Dossier that this place was “twinned” with The Blazing World.

In Nemo: Heart Of Ice, they are also humanoid animals. Which means we get…

Dogtanian And The Three Muskehounds.

We’d seen him briefly in The Black Dossier in the Blazing World, where Metapatagonia was first mentioned. And now we get a better look at the fellow, safe at home.

I’ve always enjoyed the incredibly lowbrow sitting amongst the highbrow in League and it tends to make me step back with a smile. As did the Tiger Lily/Rosebud joke towards the end…